The Sports Video Interop Group, a conglomerate of video coaching software providers, the Collegiate Sports Video Association (CSVA), and the NFL dedicated to bringing greater file interoperability to their systems, discussed the latest advances during a presentation at the CSVA Convention in St. Louis last week. Topping the list is the need to finalize paperwork to become an officially sanctioned non-profit and also find a roadmap for the move to HD.

When the Sports Museum of America opened its doors last week it also opened the doors on a new era and type of sports Hall of Fame facility as American sports artifacts come together with original film and video presentations to help tell the story of sports in America like no other venue before it.

Rick Abbott, currently Vice President, Event Operations, will assume the new position of Vice President, Global Security and Facilities Operations at ESPN. In that role, Abbott will be responsible for oversight of our Security and Facilities departments.

The U.S. Open's cable TV coverage is leaving USA Network after 25 years and moving to ESPN and Tennis Channel starting in 2009. The United States Tennis Association inked a new six-year deal and, beginning in 2009, ESPN will telecast live weekday coverage of the U.S. Open for up to 11 hours each day and night on ESPN2. It will also show prime-time coverage of the event during Labor Day weekend.

High definition coverage of this year's Wimbledon tennis championships, the Beijing Olympics and the Euro 2008 football tournament will be widely available from the BBC after the public service broadcaster launched a new free-to-air satellite platform this week in collaboration with its commercial rival, ITV.

WAWS-TV Fox 30 News is now BAS Relocation compliant after a microwave equipment overhaul led by RF Central, a digital microwave technology and integration provider.

Harris Corporation is now delivering NetVX HD video networking equipment to DIRECTV, for HD contribution encoding and transport, ultimately increasing HD program quality for DIRECTV. NetVX MPEG-2 and MPEG-4 HD video encoders are among the wide range of Harris solutions that optimize multichannel delivery workflows of today's broadcast operations.

The NHL and cable TV partner Versus are talking about introducing "puck-tracking" technology as early as the 2008-09 season, executives from the network and the league told USA TODAY.

Linear Acoustic, a manufacturer of customer-centric multichannel sound solutions for digital broadcast, has become the fourth member of the Telos Systems group, a technology partnership whose companies, including Omnia and Axia, provide advanced audio solutions for professional communications, production, and broadcast applications.

Sony Creative Software, a provider of consumer and professional video and audio editing software applications, revealed the finalists for its Technology in Motion: Vision of the Future student film contest announced last February. The contest provided all of the tools for high school students to develop video production skills while predicting the future of technology through their short films. While hundreds of schools participated in the program, the three finalists are Alpha School by students from Lisbon High School in Iowa, Contact by students from Ashland High School in Ohio and TECH 178 by students from Tandem Friends High School in Virginia.

Romantis GmbH (“Romantis”), a European satellite capacity trader providing satellite transmission services for European, African and Asian markets, signed another multi-year, multi-transponder contract for capacity on the Intelsat system to expand its service offering into the CIS, EU and the Middle East.

ESPN360.com will provide tennis fans with more than 150 hours of live online tennis coverage from Sony Ericsson WTA Tour events around the world. ESPN360.com will provide viewers exclusive coverage, including more than 70 scheduled matches at 11 events on 49 days between May and November.

Internet users in the U.S. watched 11.5 billion online videos in March, a 64% gain from one year earlier, led by Google’s YouTube with more than 4.3 billion views in the month, according to research firm comScore.

Fan cams, live-action shots and even instant replays will one day be part of the Brickie sports culture.

Under pressure to prove the effectiveness of TV advertising, the Wall Street Journal reports that ABC is announcing a new measurement tool for marketers that offers details about the viewership of particular shows beyond just ratings. ABC's new "Advertising Value Index" allows advertisers to choose from more than 15 criteria, including factors such as income level, education, employment status, how long viewers tune in to commercials or how engaged they are with the program.